Raptors Capture First Title in Franchise History
June 14, 2019
After coming into this season with many questions and doubts after trading away their franchise player DeMar DeRozan, the Toronto
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After coming into this season with many questions and doubts after trading away their franchise player DeMar DeRozan, the Toronto
Eleven months ago, in an article detailing why the Boston Celtics were the favorites for the 2019 NBA title, I labeled the Golden State Warriors; dynasty as ‘fragile’. While my praise of the Celtics proved to be excessive (I wasn’t the only one), this description of the Warriors’ dominance proved to be correct, although I did not envisage it being a literal one.
Wow is all I can say. As a person who lives in Canada and has people who said “This is the most important moment in Canadian Sports since the Toronto Blue Jays were in the World Series 26 years ago”, I cannot state how much this championship means to the country of Canada and it’s loyal and well deserving fans. The raw emotion spewing from “Jurassic Park”, the Raptors fan hangout area in Toronto was electric and fascinating to experience. All I can say to this championship is “Oh Canada”! In this article we will go over to the journey the Raptors took to get here and the trials they experienced, through the perspective of a Canadian.
From the moment Kevin Durant stunned the basketball world by signing for the Golden State Warriors in July 2016, he and the team from the Bay have been the NBA’s most notorious villains. Durant had finished the previous season, his last with the Oklahoma City Thunder, by blowing a 3-1 lead to the Warriors in the Western Conference Finals. Three weeks later, his new team-mates also managed to clutch defeat from the jaws of victory, as they squandered their own 3-1 advantage, handing the Cleveland Cavaliers their inaugural title in the most humiliating fashion.
Most everyone has heard about the “Shot Heard Round the World” which occurred July 29, 1775, and marked the start of the American Revolution. Monday night NBA fans young and old were made painfully aware of the “Pop Heard Around the NBA.” With about ten minutes remaining in the second quarter of game 5 of the NBA finals, Kevin Durant’s right calf popped and the video has been shown everywhere. Was this latest injury preventable? Should Durant have even been playing? Was Durant rushed back from a calf strain he suffered during game 5 of the Warriors playoff game against the Rockets about a month ago? I am sure these questions and many more will be asked and debated during the long period of recovery that Durant is now facing.
If you missed game five of the NBA Finals, you missed what could potentially be the end of Kevin Durant’s “prime”. To backtrack a little bit, Durant was initially injured in game five of the Western Conference Finals against the Houston Rockets when he was diagnosed with a calf strain. At the time, many, including Durant, believed it could have been an injury to his Achilles tendon. Everybody was relieved to find out that it was a calf strain instead. The Warriors’ had missed his presence in the NBA Finals so far, as they were down 3-1 to the Toronto Raptors going into game five on Monday night. To the relief of Warriors’ fans everywhere, doctors cleared Durant to play in game five of the Finals. There was plenty of speculation about him possibly re-injuring his calf and that it was a risk for him to be playing. Well, those people were right.
The 2019 NBA Finals have been nothing short of thrilling thus far. Games 1 and 2 are in the books and I am excited to see how the pivotal Game 3 plays out.
On Monday night Kevon Looney was ruled out indefinitely by the Golden State Warriors with a right first costal cartilage fracture. This latest injury just adds to the injury woes of the Warriors, who are still without Kevin Durant who is recovering from a mild calf strain and has not been cleared to play while Klay Thompson who suffered a mild hamstring strain in game 2 of the finals is listed as questionable for game three.
It all comes down to this. Sixteen teams entered. Just two teams remain. The Golden State Warriors and the Toronto Raptors have emerged as the best team from their respective conferences, and now it’s time to figure out which team is the best team in the entire league. To reflect on this crazy postseason and preview the Finals, a few of our scribes have to come together to talk about it.
Surprise, surprise. The Golden State Warriors are in the Finals again. I’m not sure there’s a person on the planet that could have credibly predicted anything else, and that can’t be said about any other team in history aside from the 1960s Boston Celtics. Don’t get me wrong, it’s absolutely a legendary feat to make the NBA Finals five consecutive times and it deserves plenty of recognition, but it isn’t exactly surprising, is it? Everyone likes an underdog story, and while this Warriors dynasty started out as one, it’s been a long time since that’s the case. So instead, I’ll focus on one specific player that I personally believe is possibly the biggest underdog story in the league – Alfonzo McKinnie.
Join Prime Time Sports Talk’s Jacob Solkoff and Mikey Berkowitz as they put their Morals Aside to give their bold
After coming into this season with many questions and doubts after trading away their franchise player DeMar DeRozan, the Toronto Raptors are now the 2018-2019
Eleven months ago, in an article detailing why the Boston Celtics were the favorites for the 2019 NBA title, I labeled the Golden State Warriors; dynasty as ‘fragile’. While my praise of the Celtics proved to be excessive (I wasn’t the only one), this description of the Warriors’ dominance proved to be correct, although I did not envisage it being a literal one.
Wow is all I can say. As a person who lives in Canada and has people who said “This is the most important moment in Canadian Sports since the Toronto Blue Jays were in the World Series 26 years ago”, I cannot state how much this championship means to the country of Canada and it’s loyal and well deserving fans. The raw emotion spewing from “Jurassic Park”, the Raptors fan hangout area in Toronto was electric and fascinating to experience. All I can say to this championship is “Oh Canada”! In this article we will go over to the journey the Raptors took to get here and the trials they experienced, through the perspective of a Canadian.
From the moment Kevin Durant stunned the basketball world by signing for the Golden State Warriors in July 2016, he and the team from the Bay have been the NBA’s most notorious villains. Durant had finished the previous season, his last with the Oklahoma City Thunder, by blowing a 3-1 lead to the Warriors in the Western Conference Finals. Three weeks later, his new team-mates also managed to clutch defeat from the jaws of victory, as they squandered their own 3-1 advantage, handing the Cleveland Cavaliers their inaugural title in the most humiliating fashion.
Most everyone has heard about the “Shot Heard Round the World” which occurred July 29, 1775, and marked the start of the American Revolution. Monday night NBA fans young and old were made painfully aware of the “Pop Heard Around the NBA.” With about ten minutes remaining in the second quarter of game 5 of the NBA finals, Kevin Durant’s right calf popped and the video has been shown everywhere. Was this latest injury preventable? Should Durant have even been playing? Was Durant rushed back from a calf strain he suffered during game 5 of the Warriors playoff game against the Rockets about a month ago? I am sure these questions and many more will be asked and debated during the long period of recovery that Durant is now facing.
If you missed game five of the NBA Finals, you missed what could potentially be the end of Kevin Durant’s “prime”. To backtrack a little bit, Durant was initially injured in game five of the Western Conference Finals against the Houston Rockets when he was diagnosed with a calf strain. At the time, many, including Durant, believed it could have been an injury to his Achilles tendon. Everybody was relieved to find out that it was a calf strain instead. The Warriors’ had missed his presence in the NBA Finals so far, as they were down 3-1 to the Toronto Raptors going into game five on Monday night. To the relief of Warriors’ fans everywhere, doctors cleared Durant to play in game five of the Finals. There was plenty of speculation about him possibly re-injuring his calf and that it was a risk for him to be playing. Well, those people were right.
The 2019 NBA Finals have been nothing short of thrilling thus far. Games 1 and 2 are in the books and I am excited to see how the pivotal Game 3 plays out.
On Monday night Kevon Looney was ruled out indefinitely by the Golden State Warriors with a right first costal cartilage fracture. This latest injury just adds to the injury woes of the Warriors, who are still without Kevin Durant who is recovering from a mild calf strain and has not been cleared to play while Klay Thompson who suffered a mild hamstring strain in game 2 of the finals is listed as questionable for game three.
It all comes down to this. Sixteen teams entered. Just two teams remain. The Golden State Warriors and the Toronto Raptors have emerged as the best team from their respective conferences, and now it’s time to figure out which team is the best team in the entire league. To reflect on this crazy postseason and preview the Finals, a few of our scribes have to come together to talk about it.
Surprise, surprise. The Golden State Warriors are in the Finals again. I’m not sure there’s a person on the planet that could have credibly predicted anything else, and that can’t be said about any other team in history aside from the 1960s Boston Celtics. Don’t get me wrong, it’s absolutely a legendary feat to make the NBA Finals five consecutive times and it deserves plenty of recognition, but it isn’t exactly surprising, is it? Everyone likes an underdog story, and while this Warriors dynasty started out as one, it’s been a long time since that’s the case. So instead, I’ll focus on one specific player that I personally believe is possibly the biggest underdog story in the league – Alfonzo McKinnie.
Join Prime Time Sports Talk’s Jacob Solkoff and Mikey Berkowitz as they put their Morals Aside to give their bold and controversial sports takes and
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